Buxus Sempervirens X Cannabis Sativa

Tonight's venue is the twelfth floor of a commercial building which has an elevator that only reaches the eleventh. Moving in had been a bitch. Access is granted by climbing the last flight of the fire escape then, if one is without swipe card, banging on the door and saying the password.

Nathan does so: 'Azza. I've got two bottles of wine.'

Waiting, Nathan lights catnip to check the markets:

₵$50 Ghost Tobacco  (20)

₵$15 Bloody Mary

₵$55 El Dorado Green (1/4)

₵$1 Bug Powder (g)

₵$1 Slut Root (kg)

₵$30 Marital Aid Potion

₵$10 Quetzalcoatl Feathers (doz.)

₵$5 Blue Roses (doz.)

₵$35 Mythril (g)

₵$9 BZTCN

Azrael opens the door. He is a short man made 8% taller with alcohol. He wears a trench coat diagonally cut between grey and black, undies and Steel Blue work boots.

Nathan waggles a Jacob's Creek 'Double Barrel' 2020 Shiraz and a Hentley Farm 'The Marl' 2021 Shiraz: 'One for you, one for me.'

Azrael glares: 'Two shirazes. You called me "Azza". Bitch, I can summon lightning.'

Nathan waggles the bottles again: 'But we're inside?'

Azrael selects the Marl. Tonight's venue used to be the property manager's residence. Of 18 guests, a dozen are gathered in the lounge room. From the kitchen, music:

 

Snippets of chitchat:

'What is a thought with no meaning? Like, what's the name for those?'

'That's why Pornhub doesn't have an amputee category.'

'Bleeeurgh. Bleuuurgh-ooo. I, feel, like a Disney Princess.'

Azrael raises left fist to chin, stretches index and middle finger to left and right tips of his lips. He casts spell with three rapid flicks of the tongue and a wine glass flies from table to his hand, which he hands to Nathan.

Nathan sez: 'Cheers bruz.'

Tonight's venue is technically the property of whatever legacy-money conglomerate owns the building. Then Azrael found the place and declared: 'I do not step shyly back from your property, but look upon it as my property, in which I respect nothing. Pray do the like with what you call my property! And, bitch, I throw fireballs.

Azrael has leased the 12th floor to Erin tonight, in exchange for one potted buxus sempervirens x cannabis sativa. Being a personal assistant to one demon after another, Erin has developed a network of unconventional entrepreneurs seeking to contact said dark lords. This milieu provided her with peculiar investment opportunities - start-up funding for profits, an allocation of products, or products successful or otherwise.

It is not the former or the latter but, um, the middle one, that is of tonight's interest. A botanist had approached Erin with the intent of propagating a hybrid of the marijuana plant with the box hedge. The propagation was successful but not the business model. Weed, true to its name, is everywhere - the hybrid did not find a market edge in either yield improvements or cost reductions. The enterprise went bust and Erin received a dozen juvenile plants in lieu of financial returns.

Erin has kept the plants in their pots for two years - they do make a nice knee-high hedge along the pathway to her unit. She makes a charming figure in ebony dress that would be considered modest but which now, as she sits on couch arm, has risen to just above the top of thigh-high stockings, her arrowhead tipped tail swishing like a snuggling cat's. Peeps of certain proclivities find it charming, at least. She makes sales pitch:

'In times of inflation and looming recession, people cut out waste. Like their dealer. The problem with growing their own dope is Neighbours. The Brits love that show but Home and Away has a following in Israel.

Also, people can see over your fences.'

Everyone laughs politely to cover the sound of vomiting.

Emily is first to raise her glass because her glass is in her hand: 'And what about the smell?'

Erin nods concessively: 'The hybrid has adopted the smell of the box hedge. Some people can't stand it, but no one smokes dope for the taste.'

Emily agrees: 'How about one of your pots for a Kevlar Sleeping Bag Onesie?'

The Albanese government's recent pivot in military policy towards missiles disappointed a lot of defence-industry start-ups, each hoping to break into the military industrial complex. A number of prototypes were deemed lost causes by their designers and so floated onto the informal market. That number is one. Emily found a sleeping bag made of Kevlar hanging in an op-shop and thought a cut there, a stitch there, a mythril sewing needle and that would make a nice onesie.

Erin disagrees: 'That looks like a khaki Michelin man. I wouldn't be caught dead in that.'

Emily winks: 'And you won't, because its Kevlar.'

'Still.'

'If it's not quite your style, perhaps accessorise with bitumen?'

Alluding to how they met, when Erin made the rookie mistake of smoking a joint before crossing the expressway. Erin clicks her tongue - fashion runways are yet to cross active motorways. (Idea for another blog post.)

'All right. One.'

The audience members paying attention chuckle politely, the other half start whispering adjunct conversations.  Nathan senses an opportunely warm crowd and zigzags to the front.

'Another petition for your curiosity?'

'Hey Nathan. Shoot.'

'Or.' Smiling. 'Don't. Are you interested in the Rifle of Woopsie-Daisy?'

Nathan manages a pizza shop because he likes the people and the work, but he side hustles as a negotiator for mortals seeking contracts with demons. As he advertises: 'I put the "bargain" in Faustian Bargain!' These demons and their contracts operate with Chainsaw Man mechanics. The demons are personifications of humanity's fears and their power is caused by how deeply and widely they are feared. Their contracts usually involve a human sacrificing something in exchange for the demon's assistance. Nathan received the Rifle of Woopsie-Daisy after haggling with the Parental Responsibility Demon. The demon wanted half of the client's future income, but Nathan haggled it down to a quarter.

But Erin is like: 'I'm not in the market for a rifle, nor do I see resale profit.'

Which is awkward but less so than the 'uh uh yeah yeah uuuh' that the speakers blurt. Someone has taken their phone to watch porn and forgotten that they are tonight's stream jockey. The speakers are silenced and glassware shattered when the kitchen explodes with completed paperwork. Alexander emerges from decapitated centrelink applications falling like autumn leaves, running left index finger under his nose: 'The only thing thicker than my Out Pile is my dick.'

A quick scan of the room reminds Alexander where he is and he darts sidestepping to the front of the crowd: 'Hey. Hey. Hi. How are you? Are you interested in a Slice of Lady Cake? It's in the fridge but I put my name on it so it's mine.'

Azrael calls from back of crowd: 'I dibs cake if you kill him.'

Erin: 'What is Lady -'

'It's a cake that causes menstrual cramps.' Alexander sniffs. 'Someone needed to license a minotaur. There's only one guy they call.'

Erin glares but curiosity demands: 'And why would I want this cake? It better be orgasm flavoured with fairy-bread icing.'

(At the back of the crowd with pizza and wine, Nathan whispers to Azrael: 'If she had bought the rifle, you would have cake.')

'Because the cramps happen once a month. And you get to decide when.'

Elbow on knee, chin on fist: 'And cake only keeps for, what, a week? These fine people don't need to know if I'm done or if I'm due.'

'You could freeze it.'

'No deal.' Frown becoming smirk. 'But. I will give you two plants, right here and now, if you eat it. I want to see what happens.'

Alexander runs left finger under nose.